Tag: book review

new release, Review

✍🏻 Professor Romance’s Review: Louise Bay’s Dr. Fake Fiance ✍🏻

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Overall Grade: B

Tropes: he falls first; fake engagement; pop star FMC; golden retriever MMC

Louise Bay’s Dr. Fake Fiance is definitely my favorite story of her The Doctors series. All of the stories in these books offer FMCs and MMCs that burrow their way into your heart. However, Beau and Vivan have something a bit more magical between them. For one, at a time when Swifties have fallen hard for Taylor and Travis Kelce’s romance, Beau and Vivian’s story has a similar feel. It’s easy to love Beau in Dr. Fake Fiance. He doesn’t take life too seriously and doesn’t know that Vivian is a superstar in hiding. He is a loveable “golden retriever” of a hero. In contrast, Vivian is guarded. She’s been hurt by the machinations of her former long-time fiance and burned by the media. London provides her with the perfect cover, but Vivian and Beau’s instant chemistry makes it difficult for her to keep hiding. Louise Bay has crafted Vivan and Beau so that friendship quickly morphs into something deeper and scary for both of them. While Beau is seemingly easy-going, we recognize that his past trauma has actually impacted him more than he ever suspects, and Vivian is granted the opportunity to take control of her life. Their story arcs are interesting and engaging, and you will find yourself cheering for their happy ending. 

Add to this the cornerstone of Bay’s The Doctors series: the familial bond of Beau’s family. This is the tether between the stories, and it acts as the grounding force for the internal struggles of this series’s heroes and heroines. It does the same for Vivian and Beau, allowing them some normalcy in their chaotic world. The guidance of Beau’s parents and his brothers’ wisdom becomes the impetus for Beau to move forward. 

If your Roman Empire is currently the Taylor + Travis romance, you absolutely want to read Louise Bay’s Dr. Fake Fiance. 

In love and romance,

Professor A

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new release, Review

✍🏻 Professor Romance’s Review: Jewel E. Ann’s Because of Her ✍🏻

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Overall Grade: A

Jewel E. Ann’s Because of Her is a true gem. I was honored to edit this book, so I read it early on. It’s been a month or so, and this book has stayed with me. Jackson/Jax/Jude Day is one of a handful of characters whose story was penetrating. I will never forget him at the end of Out of Love, offering the ultimate parental sacrifice. I felt that deep. When Jewel announced this resolution, this final story, in a series of standalone books, I wanted to celebrate. As I read her manuscript, a process that causes a distance of feeling from the story, I found myself drawn to Frankie and Jackson. Even more, it made me pine for more of this family: Jessica and Luke and Livy and Slade. Even though this book can be read as a standalone, what I loved the most is the return to this beloved world. Jewel doesn’t hold us away from Jackson’s family. She gives us access and resolution in a way that fans like me needed after Out of Love. 

If you haven’t read this series, here’s why you should read this story: 

  1. A wildly protective, assassin of a man MMC. Yes, he’s older, but he’s wildly attractive
  2. An FMC who reminds me of Jackson’s sister. You don’t have to read her Jack and Jill trilogy (although you should) to get a sense of the one person Jackson believes to be his soulmate: his sister, Jessica. Frankie embodies the same qualities: headstrong, fierce, independent, and protective.
  3. Jewel writes romances that follow the beat of their own drum. It’s hard to pin tropes on them. She intentionally rips up her characters’ lives and their storyline to interrogate different aspects of human nature. For example, one of the challenges for readers is the idea of ethics: what are you willing to do for revenge? Should you sell your soul to mete out revenge on a person who has wronged you? Jackson and Frankie turn this inside out and upside down throughout the story. This is but one of many themes she tests throughout this book as well as the rest of the books on her booklist.
  4. I’ve said this before in many reviews, but it’s important to say it again: Jewel E. Ann is a queen of quotable nuggets. As I was reading her manuscript, I would highlight sentences and type “this is a great teaser.” She wordsmiths at a level that astounds me.
  5. And finally, her intentionality in crafting romances that aren’t formulaic should get people to read Because of Her. This point is the main reason you should download your booklist today and get reading. Her voice and sense of authorial identity are unique in romancelandia. 

Jewel E. Ann’s Because of Her is the true final chapter of her Jack and Jill series. Yes, it can be read without the others, but to read it before the rest is to miss out on Jewel E. Ann’s genius. If I had any recommendation, I would download the entire series and binge-read it in one weekend. You’ll fall madly, deeply in love with Jackson, Frankie, Jessica, Luke, Livy, and Slade…

In love and romance,


Professor A

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✍🏻 Professor Romance’s Review: Ilsa Madden-Mills’s Christmas Cupid ✍🏻

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Overall Grade: B

Tropes: hate to love; enemies to lovers; forced proximity; pro hockey MMC; feisty FMC; brother’s best friend/teammate

Ilsa Madden-Mills’s Christmas Cupid is Hallmark charming with an extra helping of steam. It’s sweet and spicy and everything in between. 

Let me begin with the reasons it’s a “B” read for me:

I wanted more. I would have liked some parts of the story to be filled in more. There were some places that were outlined and required more development.

There were a few inconsistencies with details in the story. I’ve read everything from Madden-Mills, and this one isn’t as “neat” as her other stories.

Here are the reasons to read it:

The banter between Madden-Mills’s characters, Iris and Kyler, is everything to love about enemies to lovers. It’s clearly their foreplay, and it sets up their chemistry while also keeping the story a funny little nibble of romance.

Ilsa Madden-Mills doesn’t fall prey to writing the oft-used trope “I can’t get hot with my teammate’s younger sister.” Instead, Iris’s brother is the one responsible for their little tete-a-tete.

Forced proximity/one bed is the go-to set-up for a Christmas novella. 

Christmas Cupid is a quick little read that feels perfect for days that seem heavy. The journey she takes Kyler, specifically, on is an important one as Iris reminds him what’s important in life: community and relationships with people. In a world such as ours right now, Ilsa Madden-Mills’s Christmas Cupid is EXACTLY the read we need.

In love and romance,

Professor A

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✍🏻 Professor Romance’s Review: Kristen Ashley’s Too Good To Be True ✍🏻

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Overall Grade: A

Tropes: murder mystery; romantic suspense; forced proximity

Kristen Ashley’s To Good To Be True is the book form of her Kindle Vella story from earlier in the year. And, as it won’t come as a shock, it was everything you’d expect from Kristen Ashley.  While she calls it her “murder mystery,” the vibe of this book is decidedly Ghosts & Reincarnation Series-esque. 

It’s situated in an old English country home/mansion.

There are “ghost” vibes.

The FMC has dreams that make it seem she’s been reincarnated.

KA has filled it with spookish vibes.

I couldn’t put it down because it read like the books of that popular series. It is also filled with all of our favorite Kristen Ashley elements: an FMC such as a Daphne who feels like she could be a bestie; she knows herself, she loves herself, and she doesn’t suffer fools; an MMC in Ian who is all playboyish, but only has eyes for his heroine; he falls deeply in love with her before he even knows it’s happening; ancillary characters who act as wizened guides, but also others who add the drama to the story (I mean, her main characters need foils, right?); and a twisty, turney story that keeps you glued to the pages. Oh, and don’t forget, there is a four-star heat level between her main characters. Kristen Ashley’s romance characteristics are threaded through the pages of To Good To Be True, and she doesn’t have an obvious suspect in her story. If you think hard enough, you can figure it out, but it isn’t obvious, so she keeps you engaged. This is all that is wonderful with this book, but that isn’t all of it. The true gems of any KA romance/murder mystery/whatnot lie in its depths. 

To Good To Be True, like many of her recent stories, highlights important societal ails. In this book, she allows Ian, a 1%er to make better choices with his family’s estate so they can be better civic leaders. She focuses on the archaic notions of the genteel, showcasing their modern-day futility. But what I loved the most, what I found the most compelling about this story, is the truth about the past. That our past has been spoken/written through the patriarchy. Yet, women have their stories too, and they are as important, if not more important at times. She highlights/underscores/double-underlines this truth in such a beautiful maternal way. This is where Kristen Ashley is her most genius: when she shows you who she really is as a human being among other human beings.

I don’t know how she does it, honestly. How she consistently grabs my attention and holds me in the thrall of her pages, but she does it over and over again. While she has granted the label of “murder mystery” to To Good To Be True, it’s definitely much more than that, and you won’t want to put it down.

In love and romance,

Professor A

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Review

✍🏻 Professor Romance’s Review: Saffron A. Kent’s You Beautiful Thing, You ✍🏻

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Overall Grade: B

Tropes: forbidden; enemy’s little sister; best friend’s brother; opposites attract; small-town; soccer; breeding kink

I read early reviews of Saffron A. Kent’s You Beautiful Thing, You to get a sense of what early readers have said. Goodreads is such a fraught place, however. Many of her early readers love Tempest and Ledger, the main characters of this newest story. We’ve met them before in other St. Mary’s Rebels stories, and SAK piqued our curiosity about this couple, in particular. But the toxic side of Goodreads exists in the reviews for You Beautiful Thing, You too. There were a handful of reviews who DNF’d it for the things that make SAK’s romances purely her, and that troubles this reviewer.

Saffron A. Kent has a particular voice, a particular version of romance. There is intent in her authorial choices: fraught hero, almost an anti-hero; nubile FMC who seems both naive yet mature in equal measure; a fated love that transcends time and space; and an almost stream-of-consciousness narration that, oftentimes, weighs down her story. If you’re not adept at recognizing her stylistic choices, you will reduce her storytelling to particular scenes that seem farfetched and absurd, but that’s also SAK’s intent. She writes romance strewn with smut, and it’s titillating. Even more, SAK has created a niche for herself in romancelandia, and she deserves that spot. You Beautiful Thing, You underscores the ineptitude of the people closest to you to truly understand what makes you, you. This message is powerful for people who feel unseen and unheard. This is Ledger’s plight, and Tempest, his forever love, understands him better than his own family. She sees him and understands him in ways that they don’t realize until she champions him.  In her moments of helping his family realize the truths of Ledger, you fall madly in love with her character. In return, Ledger is her protection, her safe place. She grew up in a home with horrible parents, and her older brother, Reed, was her former protector. However, Reed’s life is now wrapped up in Callie and their child, so Tempest is alone except for Ledger as her protector.

There is much back and forth between Ledger and Tempest as they deny a future as a couple. As they negotiate that tension, SAK loses readers because they don’t understand the gravity of SAK’s story for Ledger and Tempest. How can Ledger love Tempest when Ledger has never learned to accept and love himself? It would be foolhardy to have him profess his undying love for her. Instead, he must struggle and strain between actions that show his love and the words to match it. I appreciated that Tempest and Ledger have a largely physical relationship with a want to create their own family before they can voice their unending love for each other. Their story must take up much of the 464 pages of this book because they have to dig through years of traumatic sludge, and SAK gives them that space. 

Beyond the foundation of their emotional journeys, Saffron A. Kent’s You Beautiful Thing, You is pure, unadulterated smut. It’s dreamy and decadently dirty. To get caught up in the appropriateness of their eroticism is to miss the point. It’s possible to craft both an angsty romance and a smutty one too. It’s what romancelandia allows. And that’s why I’ll continue to read Saffron A. Kent because she can be both things: scintillating and spicy in equal measure.

In love and romance,

Professor A

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Review

✍🏻 Professor Romance’s Review: Kandi Steiner’s Watch Your Mouth, book 2 of the Kings of The Ice series ✍🏻

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Overall Grade: A-/B+

Tropes: best friend’s little sister; teammate’s little sister; brother’s best friend; professional hockey romance; forbidden relationship; road trip romance

“And I knew even if we were about to set fire to the world we lived in now, I would gladly live in the ashes if it meant I got to be with him. We surrendered everything. We laid our old lives to rest, knowing there would be hardship and pain ahead of us. We jumped headfirst into the risk, hand in hand, willing to forsake it all in the name of each other. There was no walking away this time. There was no end to this summer.”

Among her words, Kandi Steiner wins your heart. She beguiles you with the type of romance that feels ageless, and her newest offering, Watch Your Mouth, is one of the many romances that have found a permanent space in my heart. Jaxson Brittain and Grace Tanev are everything you love about romance: attraction for days and a need for each other that transcends time and space. Each moment of this story was emotionally palpable. One minute, you find yourself laughing at Grace’s attempts (and successes) to add light to Jaxson’s safe, darkened world. The next minute, your panties are damp, and your glasses are fogging from their eroticism. Each step of the book pulls you deeper into their adventures, and Steiner doesn’t miss a step with the only exception being the forbidden trope. 

I try to avoid critiquing a book on its tropes because there are definite characteristics of tropes that seem required to the genre. However, I want to speak to Steiner’s handling of Jaxson and Grace’s coupling. I get it. Really, I get it: teammate code, bro code, girl code…it’s all wrapped up in integrity and trust. But I really, really want to read stories where the younger sister or best friend can feel drawn to each other, and it doesn’t end up being forbidden. Jaxson and Grace have bigger issues to handle without having to handle the need for her brother’s approval: his need to set boundaries with an abusive father and her need to accept her choices for the future as well as help her family recognize her value as more than her brother’s younger sister. I usually inhale Steiner’s stories, but I found myself taking breaks from this story because I grew tired of Jaxson and Grace’s internal struggles about a future together, Once they recognized their depth of feelings for the other, the story took off for me. I understand that a story has a requirement for tension. Steiner prides herself in the crafting of angst in her stories, but I think angst could have been wrought in other ways that upended the staid challenge of an older brother’s or teammate’s approval. In 2023, I think we can move beyond that.

All of that said, I still love Watch Your Mouth. I love how Jaxson and Grace complete each other; I love how Grace challenges Jaxson’s boundaries so he can rewrite his own; I love how Jaxson loves Grace from the depths of himself; I love the found family of the Ospreys and the promise of future stories for Daddy P and Coach McCabe. And I love the spice and drama of Jaxson and Grace’s story. Once they found their power in each other, Watch Your Mouth was like a slap shot to the net, and it managed to be another huge score in Kandi Steiner’s Kings of the Ice series.

In love and romance,


Professor A

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✍🏻Professor Romance’s Review: Tijan’s Pine River ✍🏻

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Overall Grade: B-

Tropes: small town dark romance; hate to love; cousin’s best friend MMC; MMA MMC; found family; new adult romance

If you’ve read Tijan’s Fallen Crest series, her newest story, Pine River, will feel similar. With two main characters who begin the book disliking each other while also overwhelmingly attracted to each other, Scout and Ramsey feel similar to her main couple, Sam and Mason, of her popular Fallen Crest series. The draw of Pine River is its engrossing story. Chapter after chapter of Scout and Ramsey spurning each other while struggling with combustible chemistry draws you into this new universe from Tijan. 

I love ‘hate to love’ and messy romance. It makes for an exciting story, and Tijan has definitely crafted this messiness well into Pine River. She had me enticed when this story existed as her newsletter story. While I was excited about this book, I was sad when she stopped publishing it in her newsletter because the push and pull of Scout and Ramsey’s chemistry drew me in. 

Here’s my issue with Pine River. It’s a disjointed read. Even though she’s done a revision of those newsletter chapters, there were times when, from chapter to chapter or paragraph to paragraph, I struggled with the flow of her storytelling and the construction of her characters’ journeys. In fact, I read some of the earlier reviews for this book because I wondered if anyone else felt the fractures in her development. Alas, I might be the only early reader who feels this way. 

Did I appreciate Ramsey and Scout’s journey? Yes. The power of the found family trope in Pine River is the best part of this story beyond her main characters’ attraction to each other. The traumas that Ramsey and Scout carry from their pasts are healed in their union but ALSO through their relationships with the ancillary characters of this story. Much as she did with her Fallen Crest series, I’m certain that Tijan has unlocked a new space in which to draw other stories. When you finish this book, that almost feels like a promise from Tijan. 

While I like the way that Tijan has crafted Ramsey and Scout in Pine River, for all intents and purposes, they aren’t Mason and Sam. Their romance, however, will entice and beguile you because Tijan has found a way to bring so much story to her readers that you can’t help but read it through to the final page.

In love and romance,

Professor A

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Review

✍🏻 Professor Romance’s Review: Laney Hatcher’s Love Matched, a Smartypants Romance ✍🏻

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Overall Grade: A

Tropes: opposites attract; fish out of water; standalone in an interconnected series; regency romance; slow burn


The brilliance of Laney Hatcher’s storytelling in the Smartypants World shouldn’t be missed. Here’s the situation: imagine taking a beloved series (Knitting in the City series) from the illustrious Penny Reid and reimagining it into the world of Regency romance. This isn’t an easy task as the women of Penny Reid’s original series read against type for that world. Yet, after Hatcher’s first two books for Smartypants, Neanderthal Seeks Duchess and Well-Acquainted, she does it with such aplomb that it’s quite astounding to the dedicated Penny Reid reader. Now, the newest story, Love Matched, poses another challenge. In the story that Love Matched re-tells, Love Hacked, the MMC is a genius hacker. How does one take a decidedly 21st-century occupation and infuse some element of it into a Regency romance? If you’re Laney Hatcher, seemingly easy. You should know that Penny Reid’s Sandra and Alex are my second favorite couple in her Knitting in the City series, so I was reading Love Matched with a critical, yet intrigued eye. How do you craft an MMC and FMC such as Sandra and Alex into 19th-century characters? Even more, when I read Penny Reid’s Love Hacked, there was a desolation to Alex’s story, a struggle to unwind himself from an outer claim on him. This bind is the tension of their story, as over and over again, Sandra must fight for their coupleship with the odds stacked against them. 

And Laney Hatcher rises to the challenge of these issues in her story, Love Matched. Even in Regency England, Sandra is headstrong, independent, and brave. Her pursuit of Alexander is the catalyst for significant change in his life, and she believes in him and their capacity for a future, just as the character in Penny Reid’s book does. Additionally, Hatcher composes Alexander with the same solitariness as Reid’s character. This is important because the Alex of Penny Reid’s book cloaks himself in that solitariness as protection. Hatcher’s ability to draw Alexander in the same, but different manner than Reid’s character doesn’t read like a copy, but rather an iteration, a complex, fully rendered reimagining. And I find this fascinating and exciting. 

Laney Hatcher’s Love Matched is my favorite of her Smartypants Romance stories thus far. Partly, I love an FMC who knows her mind and challenges social mores to ensure her eternal happiness, and I adore an MMC who challenges her but also accepts her on her own terms. The community we love and adore in Penny Reid’s Knitting in the City series is still a cornerstone of Laney Hatcher’s reconceptualization of this beloved group of women. It continues to buoy the stories. Now, I’m ready for Hatcher’s next book in the series, as it should feature my favoritest of favorites in the Penny Reid world, Fiona and Greg. What will a ninja look like in Regency England? One can only imagine it.

In love and romance,


Professor A

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✍🏻 Professor Romance’s Review: Jessica Peterson’s I Wish I Knew Then ✍🏻

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Overall Grade: A-/B+

Tropes: opposites attract; he falls first; second chance romance; small town romance; hate to love

Jessica Peterson’s I Wish I Knew Then is the perfect beginning to her newest series, Harbour Village. Peterson has envisaged a world that captivates her readers and promises more enticing stories. In this new story, Riley and Louise “Lu” meet in their youth and fall madly in love, but circumstances and familial expectations pull them apart, changing their life plans. Ten years later, Lu finds herself back in the small town where they met for her best friend’s wedding. In one moment, she reconnect with Riley, but initially their situation is precarious. The longer Louise stays in town, the more she is drawn to Riley, and she realizes quickly that Riley never forgot “Lu.” Instead, he created the world he imagined for them, and he’s insistent on reminding her of and encouraging her to realize her dreams. Can Lu move past her hurt and anger towards Riley who left her heartbroken ten years earlier?

Throughout I Wish I Knew Then, Jessica Peterson focuses on real-life situations through the course of her characters’ journeys. It’s what I love about her. It would be easy to write romance focused on crafting $ex scene after $ex scene. And Peterson lays it on “thick” in her newest book. Riley and Lu have chemistry and attraction in spades; however, Peterson has always infused her romance with real life truths. In her newest book, she untangles the difficulties of people from varied socio-economic backgrounds, the difficulty of choosing your dreams over the expectations of your family, the capacity for someone of a lower socio-economic class overcoming it to achieve success, and the balance of work and life in achieving dreams. Peterson creates characters who are female positive without giving up masculinity or being seemingly heavy-handed in its feminism. Riley is both alpha and beta. He strives to provide the means for Lu to imagine and live her dreams. He’s meant to raise her up, and this is a decided character trait, intentionally drawn by Peterson’s deft writing hands.

While Lu might be portrayed as indecisive about her future, this isn’t the case. Lu makes the greatest strides as she must buck her family’s expectations for her, pushing back against decades of familial tradition. To realize her dreams, she must choose herself. While it might seem that Peterson crafts Riley to give Lu her dreams; instead, Riley is drawn in such a way as to provide the space for her. Lu makes her own choices in her own time in her own way. Riley is simply there to protect Lu’s dreams. And that is the beauty of this romance. Riley doesn’t explain them to her; he doesn’t gift them to her; Riley simply encourages her to embrace her most truest self. My favorite moments in this book were the ones when Riley’s internal life reflects on his love for all parts of Lu. His love provides Lu with bravery because she can buck her family’s expectations for her own future.

Whether it’s the steam of her story or the intellectual insights threaded throughout her stories, Jessica Peterson has written I Wish I Knew Then to both titillate and test our perceptions. Riley and Lu’s romance will make you laugh, make you cry, and make your glasses fog. Ultimately, it will ask you to believe that love can transcend the challenges of life.

In love and romance,

Professor A

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Review

✍🏻 Professor Romance’s Review: Juliette Cross’s Peaches and Dreams, a Green Valley Heroes story ✍🏻

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Overall Grade: 4.5 ⭐️

Tropes: small town romance; single dad; grump/sunshine; opposites attract; boss babe FMC

“You’re my true north, Marly Rivers. I’ll always find you.”

Nothing makes my blood hum more than a good old-fashioned romance where the MMC is grumpy, and the FMC is sunshiny and independent and fun. This is the case with Juliette Cross’s Peaches and Dreams. Every moment of this story is a delight. Marly and Wade are opposites who attract. Wade has this tendency to judge Marly’s actions, but she quickly shows her tenderness and kindness toward his son, and it wins his heart. 

Juliette Cross has crafted a new Smartypants Romance story in Peaches and Dreams, challenging her readers to look beyond the “cover” of a person and find ways to live life to its fullest extent. It’s okay to choose yourself over your family’s expectations, and a father who loves his child is better than raising one to be just like you.

In love and romance,

Professor A